Monthly Archives: September 2011

Sony: Firmware Updates Will Not Be Troublesome in the Future

Currently, Sony's biggest problem is the way their consoles like the PSP updates their firmware. They're always often and they slow down or tie up the system which in result means that pick-up-and-play gaming sessions are halted by an essential firmware update.

This has been a problem Sony is looking to fix with the PlayStation Vita. Found here on Kotaku,Shuhei Yoshida (Head of Sony Computer Entertainment Worldwide Studios) stated the following:

"...it's very annoying when you only have one hour in your busy life to play a game, and when you have to spend 30 minutes out of that one hour to update the hardware...so it's not necessarily the frequency of how we update, it's like you saidintrusivenessof the current processes that we have on PS3 and PSP. I cannot talk about specific plans, but we are very aware of the issues, and we'd like to address those issues on PS Vita going forward."

I suggest that they go with the idea of what a lot of PCs and other technological items have been doing lately, background updating. Updating while you use a computer or a console or any other technological devices would be a very logical and proper solution to Sony's worries as well as their consumers. Hopefully that will be a successful solution they will use.

The Gears of War Series is Doing Great in Japan

So as you know, I like to report how western games are doing in Japan. Usually, when Japan's gaming community are exposed to games made in the west, they usually have a wide range of excitement (from "meh" to "omg that was awesome"). Lately, it's been "meh" with the decline of the Xbox 360 in the region. However there was a surprise at this year's Tokyo Game Show as there was a lot of excitement surrounding the series. Many members of the Japanese press talked about huge interest in the Gears of War 3 release. While Halo has a biggerpresencein Japan for shooters, Gears of War's mechanics were preferred over Halo's, this is probably due to that GOW's third personperspectiveis like Capcom's Resident Evil games.

While Gears is made for a western audience (which years ago that would have made Japanese gamers ignore the title) it seems these days Japanese gamers do like the appeal of some western games like Gears. Their only complaints are of the bad voice dubbing/subtitles. Hearing that is very odd and funny to me. It's like when I complain about poorly dubbed anime that comes here to the states.

So far, the first Gears of War sold 45,000 copies in Japan and its sequel sold 37,000 copies later on. Both titles received high praises and great reviews, despite being exclusively on the Xbox 360. While they are small numbers in comparison to the numbers they are selling here in the west (which range in the millions), you have to remember we are talking about one small island country in comparison to a grouping of countries like France, England, Canada, and the United States.

Battlefield 3's Beta will be Available at the End of September.

Found on Joystiq, EA has announced that the Battlefield 3 multiplayer open beta will commence on September 29th for the PC, Xbox 360, and PS3 platforms. The beta map to be played is called "Operation Metro" where two sides fight it out between each other in "Rush Mode". "Rush Mode" is where one team is tasked with destroying several sets of objectives, while the other defends the objectives.

Access to the beta for PC players will be available on September 27, provided they pre-ordered the game through EA's Origin Service, while beta for console players will be available to those who pre-ordered last year's Limited EditionMedal of Honor game.

Here comes Horde Mode's Wave 50. Hope You are Prepared but We are Here to Help!

Now that Gears of War 3 is released among the general gaming public, a lot of people probably have gone through the entire campaign and now trying out the online multiplayer modes available or they went straight from unboxing the game and straight into the multiplayer. Either way, it is likely that they are probably playing hours after hours of Horde mode, only for their lucky streaks of gameplay to be stopped before they reach the it-will-take-a-miracle-to-survive-this-round Wave 50. I can hear the controllers being thrown out the window (we advise against that) or screaming in rage as their characters are being overrun by Lambent and parts of the Locust Horde.

1. Make time in real life. Bathroom breaks, walking the dog, feeding your cat, needs to be taken care of first.

Going from Wave 1 to 50 even on easy mode, takes about two hours. So think ahead before you and your buddies start playing. Ask yourself some things like "did I take out the trash?" "do I need to get some vital work done?" "did I leave the stove on?" and other related questions. You don't want to be the guy who is standing idle while a Lambent Drudge decides that everyone on your team deserves a hug with his tentacles just because Mr. Mittens wanted Meow Mix.

2. Play with friends, close friends.

When playing in Horde mode, it is best to be with friends who know how you think and vice versa. While it's cool to get someone you don't know, you probably don't know how that person operates. For all we know, during Wave 33, XXCOOLGUY32XX decides it's a good idea to rush into a swarm of Grenadiers.

3. Upgrade everything.

Spike strips, retro turrets, decoys of Cole Train eating cereal, you need to upgrade them. And while I do like the charm of the hordes of Locust falling for a cardboard cutout, you need to invest money in upgrading them because as time goes on and the rounds go up in numbers, you're going to need more efficient gear.

4.Challenges, Boss Rounds, Weapon Drops,

Every once in a while, Horde mode will give your team a challenge like "no one gets killed in this wave". Upon completing one of them, everyone gets some extra cash as well as a bonus box. Don't open the boxes yet. As most guns on the ground will go away after a wave, weapon boxes will not. So best be conservative and hold onto them. Since they are likely to have a great weapon inside, best save them for boss waves.

Well that is all when it comes to surviving the waves of baddies in Horde Mode 2.0, while I can't beguaranteeingyou that they will get you through them all, they will help in the end. And you're gonna need the help you can get.

Cultural Differences Prevented Rock Band from Being Huge in Japan

A while back, Rock Band came out of nowhere and exploded in popularity all over the United States, Europe, Australia, nearly everywhere....except for Japan. There must be a reason for why the Harmonix's biggest introduction to music-themed video games didn't make its way to the land of the rising sun.

According to Harmonix Music Systems' boss Alex Rigopulos, there was always an interest to bring their game to Japan, as they were influenced by such games like Guitar Hero and Beatmania. While there were rumors that Harmonix was working on a version for Japan but it was to be a huge challenge for them. For one thing, licensing Japanese music was a difficult task. In addition, most Japanese housing are completely different from Western houses as most of the walls in Japanese homes are thinner (which means sound is easily heard) and space is greatly limited (which means Rock Band's instruments will clutter the room). Additionally, Rigopulos stated that Japanese people tend to be quieter at home and have fewer parties than us in the west.

However,Harmonix's Dance Center was released in Japan a while ago and received a good amount of positive attention in its release. Let me restate that. A XBOX game that uses THE KINECT received GOOD reception in Japan. It's not everyday you hear that in the gaming world, especially with Microsoft's failing rates in Japan.

Gears of War 3 Achievement Challenge Commences on Release Day

Whenever a big game is released, likely there is going to be a slew of achievement challenge contests out there. Well here's a big one for the release of Gears of War 3, brought to you by 360voice.comand it is called The Brotherhood Achievement Challenge. This contest will havewinners awarded $10,000 in prizes. The registration is open to everyone (regardless of region) and is currently going on. It will end October 7th.

So what are the new details of the challenge? You can get the full detailson 360voice's site for the whole of it. Basically, gamers can create and join brotherhoods of up to 40 gamers. During the time of the contest, you and your brothers have to earn the highest, combined total, gamerscores.

While there is a brotherhood element to the contest, there is an individual aspect as well for brotherhood recruiters. If a recruiter can sign on a Gears player (whethertheir account Silver or Gold) they can accumulate points for themselves, where the highest will achieve prizes as well. It will be three points for goldrecruitsand one point for silver recruits (provided the silver accounts has at least 50G in Gears and the gold has at least 1G in Gears).

If you want to join in on this highly intense and prize-loaded challenge all you have to do is sign up here. Good luck!

PS Vita Games show up at Tokyo Game Show, Shape Looks Oddly Familiar

At the Tokyo Game Show, companies like Sony and Nintendo are displaying their latest games and soon-t0-be-released consoles. One of the most interesting things coming out of TGS is the Playstation Vita. Now, when it comes to portable handheld consoles, I'm a Nintendo fanboy (despite I own the first generation DS that's the size of a brick and sometimes I am skeptic of buying a 3DS). But when the images of Sony's booth at the show were shown on the internet, I noticed something about the Playstation Vita's games.

As you can see above and here on Joystiq's article, the Playstation Vita is no longer doing the whole discs-in-cases of the PSP's UMD format and going for something that looks oddly familiar. It looks like a 3DS game cartridge mixed with one of the memory cards I use in my DSLR camera. Maybe it's just me, but it does make you think. Years ago, we thought the cutting edge of gaming consoles had to always be on compact discs, and a console that usedcartridgeswas predicted to be left in the dust.

But in these days of flash memory cards and DLC downloads and streaming software, I guess that's no longer a valid thing to think off. However, that is just my personal thought about it.

All the Gears of War 3 Skins for your weapons, so you canmutilate the opposition in style.

How to unlock Gears of War 3 Weapon Skins:

GOLD LANCER
Have the Gold Lancer from "Gears of War 2" or play a multiplayer match of "Gears of War 3" in the first week.

GOLD HAMMERBURST
Have the Gold Hammerburst from "Gears of War 2" or play a multiplayer match of "Gears of War 3" in the first week.
GOLD GNASHER
Unlock the Veteran Gear achievement in "Gears of War 2."
GOLD SAWED-OFF
Unlock the Commando achievement in "Gears of War."
GOLD RETRO LANCER
Unlocked in "Gears of War 3" beta for getting 100 kills with the Gold Retro Lancer.
GOLD OMEN WEAPON SET
Reach level 100 in "Gears of War 3."
CHROME LANCER
Earn the "Don't Hate The Player" achievement in "Gears of War."
CHROME HAMMERBURST
Earn the "Dirty, Dirty Horde" achievement in "Gears of War 2."
CHROME RETRO LANCER
Earn the "Domination" achievement in "Gears of War."
CHROME GNASHER SHOTGUN
Complete the campaign in all three "Gears of War" games.
CHROME SAWED-OFF SHOTGUN
Earn 1 achievement in "Gears of War" on PC.
FLAMING LANCER
Unlocked for playing in the second week of the "Gears of War 3" beta.
FLAMING HAMMERBURST
Unlocked for playing in the first week of the "Gears of War 3" beta.
FLAMING GNASHER
Unlocked for playing in the fourth week of the "Gears of War 3" beta.
FLAMING SAWED-OFF
Unlocked for playing in the third week of the "Gears of War 3" beta.
CRIMSON OMEN HAMMERBURST
Earned the "Welcome to Beast Mode" achievement in "Gears of War 3."
CRIMSON OMEN RETRO LANCER
Earned the "Welcome to Horde Mode" achievement in "Gears of War 3."
CRIMSON OMEN GNASHER
Earned the "Welcome to Versus" achievement in "Gears of War 3."
CRIMSON OMEN SAWED-OFF
Earned the "Welcome to Arcade Mode" achievement in "Gears of War 3."
TEAM INSIGNIA RETRO LANCER
Earn the bronze Veteran medal in "Gears of War 3" (Play 100 multiplayer matches)
TEAM INSIGNIA LANCER
Earn the silver Veteran medal in "Gears of War 3" (Play 250 multiplayer matches)
TEAM INSIGNIA HAMMERBURST
Earn the gold Veteran medal in "Gears of War 3"
TEAM INSIGNIA SHOTGUN SET
Earn the Onyx Veteran medal in "Gears of War 3"
ONYX LANCER
Earn the Onyx Lancer medal in "Gears of War 3"
ONYX HAMMERBURST
Earn the Onyx Hammerburst medal in "Gears of War 3"
ONYX RETRO LANCER
Earn the Onyx Retro Lancer medal in "Gears of War 3"
ONYX GNASHER
Earn the Onyx Gnasher medal in "Gears of War 3"

ONYX SAWED-OFF
Earn the Onyx Sawed-Off medal in "Gears of War 3"

Well, that's all of them. Frankly they don't seem that hard to achieve save for a couple of them. But as long, as I have my Chrome Hammerburst all is good for me when I play Gears of War 3.

So on Speak Up article on Kotaku about dirty controllers it came to my attention that over the years of gaming since I was a young kid that I've been always struggling with the problem about messed up and greasy controllers. We, as a gaming society, tend to take our consoles' controllers for granted and do abusive things to them. We get dust on them, weunknowinglycough on them when we had a sick day from work/school, we'd toss them out our window and get them stuck in a tree because someone on Marvel vs Capcom 3 decided to be the cheapest jerk in the world by using Sentinel-Hulk-Magneto fourteen times in a row. In result, they begin to malfunction and we have to buy another controller or send it in for repairs.

So, in a gesture of proper controller care, I decided to share some tips on how to take care of your controller so malfunctioning rarely or never occurs in your gaming life.

1. Use electronic cleaning wipes.
Why? Because it makes sense. By wiping that grease from your lunchs Double-Double Animal Style off your Active Reload, it is less likely your controller is going to slip out of your hands and break on the ground during an intense round in Horde Mode in GOW3.

2. Avoid eating something that leaves dusts while you play with your controller.
Cheetos are a common suspect in this case. Cheeto dust leave behind a greasy film on your controller and the dust can likely get into the hard to clean ridges of your controller and probably inside it as well. If you must eat cheetos while mowing down noobs online, have a pile of wet naps at your side at all times. You'll thank me later.

3. When angry, don't take it out on your controller.From a personal standpoint, it is best to just not do it. Unless you are like me and want to climb an aging orange tree to fetch your Xbox controller. Your controller didn't do anything wrong, so why damage it?

So those are my tips on taking care of your controller. There are many other tips out there like them, but these are the ones I've come across a lot in my gaming life. And if you play as many games as I do, they are tips to live by.

Metacritic gives Gears of War 3 a high 91+ rating.

So as of now, a lot of the largely known video game review sites like Giant Bomb and Official Xbox Magazine have gotten their review copies of Gears of War 3 and have likely ran through most (if not all) of the game's story content and probably did a few private online multiplayer matches. And it seems like they spared no time to get their word out there about Epic Games latest release to raise more attention in the general gaming public. Here's what the reviewers are saying:

"The evidence is indisputable: Gears of War 3 is the ultimate realization of the Xbox 360 console, much in the same way Halo 2 was for the original Xbox. It maximizes the hardware's horsepower; boasts a fully featured, seamless online experience that serves up both competitive and cooperative gameplay; and it's enduringly replayable online or off. Quite simply, Gears of War 3 leaves no stone unturned - it's everything a triple-A blockbuster should be." ~OFFICIAL BOX LIVE MAGAZINE

"It answers questions. It leaves things in a dramatically different place than they were at the start of the game. If this were to be the final game in the Gears franchise, it'd be a satisfying place to leave things."~GIANT BOMB

"Only the staunchest Gears haters will find much fault here... ...this is the best execution yet of an idea that spawned one of the biggest modern franchises in all of gaming. What's not to love?" ~GAME INFORMER MAGAZINE

So with these reviews and also the other numerous ones coming from other review sites like Destructoid and Gamespot, Gears of War 3 managed to score a metacritic score of around an average of 91. Not bad for a game that hasn't been released to the general public yet. Likely, the more people get their copies of the game, the more likely the game's score will go higher and higher. I wouldn't be surprised if the metacritic score goes past 95.

We offer our customers a large number of ways to reach us. We will not stop until you are a 100% happy with your product. Don't be surprised if you get an email 2 months from now asking how your controller is treating you.